Tuesday, 22 December 2009

#30 - Rossobianchi Award 2009

So this blog has not been going enough to be a full year, but that doesn't mean we can't do end of year award. Everyone loves them. The internet loves lists. Not as much as it loves cats, sadly. Anyway. I only have one award, having more than one is totally played out.

Rossobianchi Player of the Year 2009:


Rossobianchi's Player of the Year didn't sign for Real Madrid, doesn't play for Barcelona (neither do 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th), didn't name their son "Kai Wayne", didn't sell access to the clubs training ground despite being captain of their club and country, didn't handball twice and after Paul McShane defended badly and whilst Shay Given was out of position, didn't blame Ireland's defence for the goal and join Ipswich Town as manager, is shockingly not called Filippo Inzaghi, isn't Xmas #1, would have done something at the Copenhagen summit, didn't turn on the Large Hardon Collider, and definitely did not die before his super sell out tour.

Of course. I'm talking of Patrice Evra. The most amusing player at United for a good long time. Evra has given us
magic moments of comedy entertainment and consistently brilliant performances.

We (just me) are sure this award will mean more to him more than any trophy ever could.


Don't worry though. Real blog coming post-Xmas. Probably after we lose 3-0 to Hull City as Bobby Zamora plays in disguise and de Laet, Evra and even Mike Phelan are injured by a falling satellite. Curiously a bSkyb one.
You heard it here first.


This half-arsed blog has been brought to you by;
  • Being so old that I now find Festivus far more exciting than Xmas.
  • Refusing to say Christmas because I'm a stubborn "militant" atheist.
  • Making excuses to constantly eat fast food.

Tuesday, 8 December 2009

Surprise!

Apologies of course, for the lack of updates. My little brain (pictured) has been making hard work of things and my chronic laziness has peaked. I will get back to updating this again... when I think of something funny.

Until then I'm going to avoid any sort of defending in case I get injured.

Thursday, 12 November 2009

#29 - Sense

In a move of sheer laziness I'm just to link to another article to bring it to attention. This is from the Guardian's (Manchester United supporting) Rob Smyth:

Have referees closed ranks against Manchester United?

It's a very good read. Interesting stuff! And hey... it counts as a new blog post so makes me feel like I actually do good work.

I'm going to pat myself on the back from a while.

#28 - Outbursts

Oh. Nani! Bless him. If he had a brain he'd be bloody brilliant. Unfortunately, he has not. His talent is frequently wasted with poor decisions. Then every now and then he'll do something absolutely superb. Like a true winger, really.

If you're not big on news, but big on frequently unattractive females with big tits (that's what the 4th beer of the night is for), you probably read The Sun or something similar. Yes I realise I made fun of tabloids (pictured) in the last blog post but I may as well keep up a good rhythm. The Sun loves to sensationalise more than anyone.

Let's see how they took this:
Big headline - You’re screwing up my career (in capitals, of course) Here's his actual quotes:

"Ferguson is a very complicated man. He's tough. If things are all right, then they are all right. But when he thinks something is wrong, everything is screwed. He can go from complimenting you to just plain trashing you in a matter of minutes. Has it happened to me? Hell, yes! He'll say 'Nani, how could you miss this or this'?"


Not exactly a revelation so far.
"He shouts at players in front of everyone. No one escapes, everybody is the same. Giggs and Neville suffer most, because they have more experience. It is 'Fuck' here and 'Fuck' there."

Old news.

"People expect more from me and it's not easy. But they are also not doing what they said they were going to. I know it would be better if I scored more goals. I can have a spectacular game but nobody guarantees me I will be starting the next match. It shatters your confidence. I did not play the important matches, against Liverpool, Manchester City or Tottenham. Not playing these games, I am a bit sad. But for now I am not considering leaving."

Is his career being mismanaged? "As it is now, I think so."

Well. Maybe if you played better then, Nani. Still not biggie. He has the right to complain about not getting a run of games, because he's not at all. None of our squad are. Whether that helps in the long run for a long season or hinders player development for now... is a matter for people who are getting paid to write about things like this. For free... this all you get from me.


Cutting out The Sun's keywords of "astonishing", "explosive", and of course "no-holds-barred". Which make it sound like a pretty good wrestling cage match.. really there's not much to see here.
If I ran a paper (I'll call it Gazzetta della Me) the headline would be "disgruntled player is disgruntled".

Sunday, 8 November 2009

#27 - Light Relief

I'll get back to today's (now technically - yesterday's) footballing incidents. Until then, let's laugh at the News at the World who think Barcelona will pay £85m for Wayne Rooney.

Ahahahahahhaahaha.

Ahahahah!

Hahahahahaa.

Hahaha..

Ahh..ha..

This is why I do not reading Tabloids.

Monday, 2 November 2009

#26 - Castrol Rankings

I've decided lately to reform the way do these blogs. Instead of essentially copying the excellent Guardian Fiver. I'll just do whatever the hell I want instead. Is it laziness? You betcha.

Today, I'm looking at the Castrol Rankings. I've no idea how these are worked out because stats.. are stats. So mean nothing really. Here's how our lads do and some of our ex-lads as well.

3. Cristiano Ronaldo
4. Gerard Pique
12. Nemanja Vidic

31. Wayne Rooney
39. Dimitar Berbatov
43. Edwin Van Der Sar
53. Michael Carrick
64. Ryan Giggs
Tied at 75. Rio Ferdinand and Jonathan Evans
80. Diego Forlan

92. Patrice Evra
95. John O'Shea
105. Darren Fletcher
123. Giuseppe Rossi
147. Carlos Tevez

173. Ji-Sung Park
180. Antonio Valencia
448. Paul Scholes
646. Phillip Bardsley

700. Anderson
770. Mikael Silvestre

885. Gary Neville
931. Rafael
935. Louis Saha

967. Michael Owen
1028. Nani
1188. Ben Foster
1371. Wes Brown
1382. Gabriel Obertan
1399. Tomasz Kuszczak
1603. Ruud van Nistelrooy
1805. Fraizer Campbell

1839. Ferderico Macheda
1856. Darron Gibson
1948. Fabio
2006. Danny Welbeck
2057. Ritchie de Laet
2164. Chris Eagles

2205. Zoran Tosic (with just 1 point)
Unranked: David Beckham (possible due to time at MLS), Owen Hargreaves (obvious reasons), Rodrigo Possebon, Tom Cleverley, et cetera.

Now then. That basically doesn't mean much. Alot of these are relative with some not playing enough games and others just being obviously wrong. Let's have a look at some more craziness before I continue.

Thierry Henry is the best player in the world. He was probably, at one point back around 2003-2004. Rafael Marquez is the second best defender in the world.

Our own Gerard Pique came out first. I have huge respect for Pique and would love him back, but is he the best centre back in the world? No. Although in time he could well be.

Florent Malouda is apparently better than Andres Iniesta. With Tim Cahill coming a good 21 places higher of, 85th best player in the world, Kaka. Yes, THAT Kaka.

Luca Toni and Claudio Pizarro are higher up than David Villa, Edin Dzeko, Wayne Rooney, Raul and Zlatan IbralookslikeZachBraffovic (My beloved Pippo Inzaghi is tied with Ibrahimovic and Grafite[d Grease]).

Christian Abbiati is the greatest goalkeeper in the world. Hertha Berlin's Jaroslav Droby is second. I admit to not knowing who he is either. Buffon, Cech and Casillas and way below the likes of.. *ahem*.. Robert Green, Thomas Sorensen and Heurelho Gomes.

So. What is the point of this post? Not much really. Except to emphasis the point (if it hasn't been enough already) that stats in football are meaningless and misleading. You can rack up your pass count, saves per shots ratio and goals per minutes. But it's meaningless. To be a top class player, you must first play for a top class team in which you are winning major trophies.

I'm unranked by the way.

Peace!

Thursday, 22 October 2009

#25 - Bumper

Your resident blogger apologises for the lateness of this bumper-ish edition post, but you'll just have to get over it. I'm not getting paid! So, where to start?

Manchester United (pictured) will come back from Moscow very satisfied with what was in my opinion our best performance this new season. Excluding the first 70 minutes or so against Bolton Wanderers. Antonio Valencia has recently decided the upside to scoring goals and enjoying a rich bit of form. Nani has looked good, yes I just said that. Fabio was excellent on wednesday, and it's hard to pick out a bad performer. No Nemanja, put your hand down.

For those who are in anyway visual impaired, were obstructed by a large object or just fell asleep whilst watching the television. Listening to the commentators on wednesday afternoon you would think you were watching Alan Titchmarsh's brand new show: "Blades of Grass". With far more talk about grass, bouncing of balls on grass and so forth football seemed to be on the back burner.


The win in a tough Moscow climate but's us more than comfortable in our Champions League group and it would take a cock up of freakish proportions to push us off it. Home games against CSKA and Besiktas still to come we're pretty much there. This cannot be said for Liverpool. Who still have to travel to Lyon and host Fiorentina. As we look ready to get our revenge for the taunts we had to suffer in 2005.

Liverpool will feature a few more times in this blog. Mainly because of the huge game coming up this Sunday, with question marks over the only two Liverpool players who actually are any good, this has all of us licking our lips unlike the baby pictured.

Of course. Liverpool lately are more associated with beach balls. With one Liverpool beach ball sold on on Ebay for £43. Do I really need to say anything more over this subject? It's still hilarious. With the misfortunes of said Beach Ball and Ballon Boy it is not a good time to be an inflatable object. Sammy Lee is said to be looking nervous.

Rio Ferdinand is a hot topic right now. And this blogger has no idea why. Yes, he has certainly made mistakes lately, but this is always likely with Rio, we should expect that. Just because he's been in the form of his life for the past two seasons and only now has dipped slightly people think it's the end of the world. Yes, Jonny Evans is banging on the door for a first team spot, but that is only because he is an excellent prospect. And yes, Nemanja Vidic did have a few shaky moments in CSKA, but honestly he's been much better than that earlier on the season. A nice powerful tower-above-Jamie-Carragher header in front of the kop on sunday would be nice though.

Since this blogger was too lazy to update on the weekend, last cast our minds back to the Bolton Wanderers match. A slowly improving (and unlucky not to be higher in the league) Bolton Wanderers side were the visitors. A 2-1 really did flatter Bolton, unless you only saw the last 15 minutes or so in which for some reason we decided to crawl up in to a ball and hope Bolton didn't score. With the old Bolton tactics of hoofing up as far as possible and hoping something happens always a threat, they were honestly unlucky not to equalise later on. Of course, they were also lucky not to be 6-0 down at half time.

Oh. There was an international break before that.. oh.. ah... I'm still awake. No, I just can't handle it; I've lost my mojo now.

This blog has been brought to you by;
  • Shreddies.
  • A very poor lack of self discipline.
  • The awesome sounds of Mariachi el Bronx.
  • The very excellent, Uncharted 2.